Pop Culture Whitman: Franco On ‘Leaves of Grass’

Pop Culture Whitman: Franco On ‘Leaves of Grass’

“In this age of social media, self-promotion is the name of the game. We all have our little avatars, our little pictures and texts that we put out into the electronic world, that we hope get “liked.” Walt Whitman too was a self promoter, a performer, a purveyor of self.

‘I exist as I am, that is enough,’ says Whitman in the 1855 version of ‘Song of Myself,’

If no other in the world be aware I sit content

And if each and all be aware I sit content (‘Song of Myself,’ 46)

These enlightened sentiments are typical of Whitman in his first edition of Leaves of Grass, but these renunciations of investment in fame are not wholly true. …”